With this cull Moyes has discarded a total of nearly 30 years of coaching the Fergusonian way, three decades of wisdom and expertise soaked up from working with Britain's greatest manager. Here, Moyes has also displayed his courage. Ferguson, while retaining understandable loyalties to Phelan, Steele and Meulensteen, will surely admire the intestinal fortitude of his chosen heir.

The 50-year-old is following instinct as he looks to build a team of his own trusted cohorts, with Steve Round, for Phelan, Phil Neville (Meulensteen), and Chris Woods (Steele) all expected to be hired. Like Moyes, all are from Everton, and a fourth key appointee should also arrive from Goodison Park: Robbie Cooke, currently the chief scout, who is expected to replace Martin Ferguson, who held the post at United before following his brother into retirement earlier this month.

As an ex-United player Phelan will always retain the affection of fans, but it is the impending departures of Meulensteen and Steele that are causing most disquiet among the congregation. Considered one of Europe's finest coaches, Meulensteen was Ferguson's hands-on man charged with designing and implementing first-team training sessions and whose expertise, according to United's website, "a number of senior players such as Ryan Giggs and Ruud van Nistelrooy benefited from".

Against this CV and deep pool of in-club respect stands Neville, a former Red with more than 300 appearances for the club, who was Moyes's captain at Everton, won 59 international caps, and is on Stuart Pearce's England Under-21 coaching staff at next month's European Championship. Yet his lack of experience of taking any first-team sessions is the chief question mark over him. Given Round's time in assisting not only Moyes but Steve McClaren as England head coach, it may be that Neville takes a more junior role at United.

Steele was the man credited for turning around David de Gea's difficult season and whose commitment to the young goalkeeper's career stretched to learning his native Spanish. So to allow him to walk away again illustrates Moyes' cast-iron self-belief.

The easy option would have been to retain most or all of the old guard, not just for their knowledge but to avoid causing emotion with the potential to disrupt from those still at the club. Into this band fall chiefly the players, who have built up healthy and productive relationships with the coaches and who might wonder how the Scot's decisions will impact on them.

The onus is on Moyes to impress his new squad and, of course, vice versa. As Gary Neville says: "They [the players] should see it as a new challenge and an important challenge. I know from speaking to other people in football that since Sir Alex announced his retirement other clubs have already been lifted by the fact he is no longer around. The players should see that as a slight on them and say: 'Hang on, do you think we can't go out on that pitch and perform without our manager?' That is a challenge in itself and ultimately the players and David Moyes will need to respond to that.

"It won't be a bed of roses – there will be ups and downs as there always is and there has been over the last 26 or so years. There will be pressure moments in the coming season when people will say: 'Oh, it's not the same.' But it's too easy to say that. Everybody is waiting to see how this post-Sir Alex Ferguson era is going to work. The club have had it before with Sir Matt but everyone here will stick together."

Since starting work last week the new manager has shown that from now on Manchester United is going to be the Moyes way or the highway. How successful this will be should fascinate.